OCLEM Could Have Meant Real Oversight, But Instead is More of a Broken System
By Raymond Goins
In the months since I have been released from serving a lifetime of incarceration, I have been fortunate enough to give testimony during hearings with the Board of Supervisors about my conditions of confinement while incarcerated here in Santa Clara County. I have testified to the Board of Supervisors to give perspective to not just what is actually occurring within the confines of the walls of Santa Clara Counties jails, but to what is actually being felt by those who are vulnerable to the lack of oversight, and the intended consequences that come from a rouge body that is not functioning properly.
I have also been fortunate enough to participate in meetings with Michael Gennaco and the staff of the OIR Group, which has been contracted to serve as the consulting firm to run the Office of Correction and Law Enforcement Monitoring (OCLEM). We have discussed their role as the oversight mechanism that is supposed to keep the citizens of Santa Clara County (the incarcerated) and otherwise safe. A central focus of our discussions has been their position on the Sherriff’s proposal to arm their department with Tasers. During these meetings I was often dumbfounded by the position that Mike Gennaco and his OIR Group takes which often conflict with what the reality is. To be brutally honest, I am disgusted with their justification for advocating for the arming of the Sheriff Department with another deadly weapons that will undisputedly be disproportionately used against 1.People of color,2.LGBTQ community, and 3.those who suffer a mental illness.
Despite the Sheriff Office acknowledging that violence is down in the jails, the OIR Group sat across from the Board of Supervisors with representatives of Axon to help the sales pitch as to why the tax payers of Santa Clara County should foot the bill for a weapon that will undoubtedly do more harm than good.
The OIR group was awarded the contract from the county of Santa Clara in response to the 2015 Blue Ribbon Commission desire to improve Custody Operations, which identified a lack of accountability in the county jails and to increase fairness and accountability. Per the Santa Clara County CA Code of Ordinances, ”It is the intent of the board that these functions will assist the sheriff office, department of corrections, and all other relevant County departments in achieving and maintaining a culture and level of service that align with County values and will further the counties commitment to increasing public safety, facilitating diversion and reentry, and reducing recidivism.”
The Santa Clara County CA Code of Ordinances clearly lays out the duties in which the OIR Group shall perform. An example of these include “Monitoring that includes matters relevant to Custody Health Services policies and procedures, as well as policies of Santa Clara Valley Healthcare and the Behavioral Health Services Department.” Which to me means that the same group who is advocating for Tasers are also responsible for oversight over the other two branches of corrections - medical and mental health.
So in clear terms, they have oversight over the excessive force that will be used by the Sheriff department, then they will have oversight over the medical trauma that will occur from the torture and if the victim was mentally ill, they will also have oversight over that. Again it may be limited in scope but it is problematic for an oversight group who is historically friends with the sheriff and has become the veil to cover for the sheriff.
The true oversight domain of OCLEM can have much more impact than how OIR is operating that office. Another example is their oversight afforded to them over related departments. The code states, “Consistent with Government Code section 25303, reviewing and making recommendations regarding policies and best practices of the Office of the District Attorney and the Office of the Public Defender that have an impact on jail or law enforcement operations.”
This indicates that this OIR group has oversight over our local District Attorney, however how limited in scope it may be. Their needs to oversight given and reports published to the community so that the veil of secrecy is pulled back.
I have also sat in on numerous other Board of Supervisor hearings where the members that represent our great county all echo the need to help those who are mentally ill, yet here is the OIR Group advocating that the best policy practices include tasering these human beings. The introduction of Tasers will cause public harm not increase public safety, will facilitate division not diversion, and will only add to recidivism.
It is apparent that the County of Santa Clara Board of Supervisors awarded a contract to a group that does not share its same core values. It was stated that the county’ intent to have an oversight group who can “reimagine the culture and operations of the jails, as well as the Sheriffs law enforcement operations, to better align those services with the County’s ongoing public safety reform efforts.” Then awarding a contract to a group whose values align more with his friends in the Sheriff department and Axon, than the county and the community in which they are supposed to protect, is not a step in reimagining the culture and operation of jails, as well as sheriffs law enforcement operations. And that charge is what the board states as their intended function for this oversight body. Awarding the oversight role and contract to the OIR Group is just more of the same of a broken system.
OCLEM…A Broken Promise
By Jose Valle
If slavery or child labor was authorized, would developing a policy and training for slavery or child labor be the right thing to do? This line of thinking seems to be the case for OCLEM, Santa Clara County’s Sheriff’s jail and law enforcement independent monitoring agency.
OIR, who has been contracted to fill in the shoes of OCLEM since 2020, first seemed promising. OCLEM’s responsibility has been to monitor the Sheriff’s jail and law enforcement operations, Custody Health Services, Santa Clara Valley Medical Center and Behavioral Health Services Department, reviewing and making recommendations regarding policies and best practices of the District Attorney, use of force patterns and in-custody deaths.
On average, OCLEM staff members are paid $250 an hour, with their highest paid staff member Dr. David Hellerstein getting paid $385 an hour. OCLEM’s full pay, from the County of Santa Clara, is $7,553,554 big ones. OIR is contracted until January 14, 2030 to make policy recommendations supposedly based on “best practices” on what has been known historically as bad practices, like tasers, tear gas and mass incarceration. OCLEM’s scope is limited. Based on their contract, they can’t make recommendations on whether or not the Board of Supervisors or the Sheriff’s Office should take on a bad practice, instead they are limited to recommending the best way to implement a bad practice? Make sense?
Best Practices For Bad Practices?
Although tear gas has almost exclusively been used on Santa Clara County’s mental health population that has been determined by the courts to be mentally incompetent, in a San Jose Spotlight article, OIR’s head honcho Michael Gennaco is quoted stating:
“Absolutely, yes we support … the continued use of (chemical agents),” - Michael Gennaco, Why Is Santa Clara County Still Using Tear Gas In Jails? by Ben Irwin, San Jose Spotlight, September 11, 2023
Although Tasers have been restricted from California prisons, OCLEM representative Samara Marion stated the below during a CCLEM Committee meeting:
“We are supportive of the policy development around tasers, we are supportive of a policy if tasers are implemented and authorized… so that they can be used in the most effective and safe way” - OCLEM representative Samara Marion, CCLEM Committee Regular Meeting, August 22, 2023
During that same CCLEM meeting, both the Sheriff’s and OCLEM were pressed with controversy after Sheriff Bob Jonsen stated that AXON’s new hot “Taser 10” was recommended by both the Consent Decree Use Of Force Monitors and OCLEM.
“They (Taser 10) are recommended by our Consent Decree Use Of Force Monitors, OCLEM and used by every agency in the county and neighboring Sheriffs departments in San Mateo, Alameda and Santa Cruz“ - Sheriff Bob Jonsen, CCLEM Committee Regular Meeting, August 22, 2023
Does the public not see this as a conflict of interests? Or a contradiction? As a community, do we not expect more from an independent monitoring agency other than being the Sheriff’s co-signer?
The Logic of “Best Practices” of Oppressive Systems - Slavery and Child Labor
The reality shared by American history is that you just can’t put a best practice or create a good policy or law on oppression.
Could you imagine an independent monitoring agency that hides behind a veil of having no position on slavery or child labor? And restricted to recommending the best policy possible for slavery or child labor? Then making an impression that this somehow makes slavery or child labor better?
Slavery was first introduced to the Americas in 1492 during Spanish colonization. The Spaniards had already brought with them slaves and indentured servants from Spain to the Americas. They then enslaved Mexicans (Native Americans) and later Africans. The British introduced slavery to what would later be the United States in 1619 and we all know that the United States followed suit until President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, declaring that all enslaved Africans were free. And believe it or not, there were failed policies and laws created during slavery that somehow attempted to right a wrong. In fact, our current 13th amendment is credited to abolishing slavery except for incarcerated peoples which reflects the same demographics of previously colonized and enslaved peoples. They gave Black folks their freedom but on the same token gave them Jim Crow laws to incarcerate an entire people in mass.
Child labor supposedly ended in the United States in 1938 but child labor in the fields, an occupation previously filled by slaves, and whose demographics are predominantly Mexican are still an issue in present day. It may still be an issue for an undocumented immigrant to vote or legally reside in the United States but it's definitely not an issue for the average American to eat a burger without tomatoes and lettuce picked by a Mexican.
The OIR Group claiming their role is simply to find the ‘best practices’ of lethal weapons to be used on the incarcerated is analogous to an oversight body finding best practices for slavery of child labor.
My Road in Supporting the Rights of the Incarcerated
I am formerly incarcerated, a community organizer and prisoner’s human rights advocate for Silicon Valley De-Bug.
I supported the incarcerated in Elmwood to push for college credit courses.
I adhered to the concerns of hunger strikers and their families behind the Chavez V. Santa Clara County federal consent decree to end infinite solitary confinement and improve jail conditions.
I sat alongside the sister of Michael Tyree in court when officers were found guilty of murder.
And I was there every step of the way for incarcerated folks and their families when contracted with Covid-19 positive in our jails, met with neglect and the most inhumane medical treatment I’ve heard of in all my years.
When correctional officers were abusing their power, cases of physical and sexual abuse, questionable deaths, or lack of medical treatment, I was there for families and their incarcerated loved ones to attempt to get some type of answers, grievances heard, and offer my support.
With my efforts, and through Silicon Valley De-Bug, we have changed California law, shaped policy that directly impacted incarcerated folks and acted as support for families and incarcerated folks.
I do not get paid $250 an hour, I do not collect data, make reports or give recommendations to inherently bad practices. I am still very much a working class community organizer but how is it that with limited resources, I have been able to push boundaries beyond data reporting and making recommendations for bad practices that even a blind man can see?
Officers already have plenty of staff, training, and tools including military weapons such as Clear Out tear gas and there is absolutely no need to to add another inherently deadly weapon to their tool belt. The wheels of justice turn far slower for the incarcerated directly impacted by generational poverty and inequality, who remain powerless and voiceless, and whenever an incarcerated loved one does die, families are often not contacted, or given any answers until after years of pain and the civil courts get involved.
There is absolutely no safe way to use a taser in a jail setting, the only guarantee that we have is that there will be more abuse, deaths and lawsuits.
If OCLEM, OIR or any independent monitoring agency is going to work, they have to at least be able to put their foot down when tasked to make recommendations for a system of oppression. Most importantly, an independent monitoring agency has to be able to do more than just monitor, they have to be able to hold bad actors accountable and push policy that reflects the safety and restoration of the directly impacted. That would be the right thing to do!
The Problem with OIR and OCLEM
Raj Jayadev
The creation of the Office of Correction and Law Enforcement Monitoring (OCLEM) was the consequence of enduring human rights abuses, a murder by jail guards, and an accumulation of lawsuits and litigation. Given the litany of structural issues at the jail, and the clear position that the Sheriff’s Office was unwilling to correct their management - the concept of an “independent” body to monitor the jail, as well as track the implementation and status of improvements identified by county administrators, was a natural bureaucratic response. The firm called the OIR Group was paid significantly by the County to take the position of the OCLEM. The OIR Group has secured these contracts, and played similar roles in other jurisdictions in California.
The problem is how the OIR Group has run OCLEM not only avoids confronting the issues that led to the creation of the office to begin with, their existence actually allows the concerns of the jail to continue, except now with the condonement and protection of an independent body to give political cover to the Sheriff’s Office.
The most blatant example of this being the proposal by the Sheriff to arm officers with Tasers. With all but a wink and a nod, the Sheriff unrolled the idea of the County buying the lethal weapon with a premise that they would only move forward if it received the blessings and the safety parameters of the OCLEM. If the OCLEM understood its role of doing an honest and thorough assessment to the question, “Should the County buy Tasers to arm correctional officers in the jail and on patrol?” then it could be argued that an independent body assigned to monitor the jail filled an important function.
But the OIR Group sees OCLEM through a deliberately squinting lens. They claim they cannot answer that question, as it is beyond their scope. They claim their role is to only evaluate if the Sheriff would implement the weapon by “best practice” standards when it is used. (This is apparently a selective decision to “sit this one out” as the head of the OIR was previously quoted in a San Jose Inside article as actively endorsing the use of another weapon, tear gas: “Absolutely, yes we support … the continued use of (chemical agents),” said Michael Gennaco, a nationally recognized expert on law enforcement accountability, who heads the third-party monitor that conducted the report.”)
That covered mouth by the OCLEM on the most obvious question regarding Tasers - what some might argue is the entire reason for the office - then allows the Sheriff to proceed with a Taser plan with the added insulation that the implementation of Tasers were not objected to by an independent office that is an expert in jail conditions.
A Board of Supervisors can then vote for a lethal weapon to be brought into the jails with the claim that the weapon has been vetted and cleared by the monitoring office the county established. The enormously painful, lethal, racist, violent decision to use County monies to buy a lawsuit magnet called Tasers appears more palatable when covered in OCLEM veneer.
That is how the existence of OCLEM, as occupied by the OIR Group, makes things worse and more dangerous for people in the jail.
